Hyderabad: Two more special trains carrying over 2,000 migrant workers left Telangana for Bihar and Jharkhand on Wednesday, officials said.
Both the trains departed from the Bibi Nagar railway station in Yadadri Bhuvangiri district near Hyderabad early on Wednesday morning.
Migrant workers from Yadadri Bhuvangiri and other districts were brought to the railway station by buses late on Tuesday night.
A team of 50 personnel from the health department led by the district medical and health officer screened the workers before allowing them into the station.
Officials said that all necessary arrangements were made for the smooth journey of the workers. Yadadri Bhuvangiri District Collector Anitha Ramchandran, along with senior officials, supervised the arrangements at the station.
The workers expressed their happiness on returning to their home states after a long wait. They said they had registered their names with the police stations concerned and were duly informed about the travel arrangements made.
With this, the number of special trains operated for migrant workers from Telangana rose to four. The first train had left for Jharkhand on May 1, while the second departed for Bihar on May 5.
Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao had said on Tuesday said that 11 trains carrying migrant workers were leaving for various states. He said five of these trains were leaving for Bihar, two each for Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh and one each for Jharkhand and Rajasthan.
However, the information about the operation of the trains is being kept confidential to avoid entry of unauthorised persons into the railway stations.
The Chief Minister had said after the state cabinet meeting that the migrant workers can’t be sent in thousands and lakhs as this needed the consent from their home states.
He said he spoke to Chief Ministers of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and other states and they wanted Telangana to send the list of the workers who wanted to come so that they could make proper arrangements for their transportation to their respective districts and villages.
“I wanted to send 40 trains but we need the consent from the3 concerned states,” he said.
The Chief Minister said the trains carrying migrant workers to Bihar will come back with 20,000 to 25,000 workers from Bihar who work in rice mills in Telangana. A train which left early on Tuesday for Bihar will bring back 1,200 workers from there.
